Art: Visual Fringe

The Cincinnati Fringe Festival has been diligently working to make its Visual Fringe component an important part of the overall festival experience. For this year, the Visual Fringe Selection Committee (chaired by Matt Steffen) received applications from 30 artists and chose seven to display their work at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, near the festival headquarters at Know Theatre.

During the course of the Fringe Festival, the artworks can be seen at the Academy from 6-10 p.m. weekdays and noon-10 p.m. on weekends. Admission is free. Meanwhile, following up on a popular Visual Fringe event from last year, Danny Babcock and Matthew Daylor will again be painting a mural on the north wall of the Know Theatre headquarters building at 1120 Jackson St.

Among the artists selected to represent the visual art component of the Fringe Festival, Chicago-based Isabelle Schiltz stands apart from the rest. Her two videos on display at the Art Academy of Cincinnati’s Chidlaw Gallery test extremities while she pushes her body to multitask in performances that employ both voice and body movement. The exquisite “La Vie En Rose” looks on at a glossy plastic mat that the artist, mostly off-screen, punches with brutal force while singing Edith Piaf’s standard.

Click here for the festival's Visual Fringe page. Check out CityBeat's Fringe Festival Central for reviews of all 31 theatrical performances and a preview of Film Fringe.